


a perfect design

by finalizer



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Humor, M/M, if u squint, warning: contains trace amounts of fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-29
Updated: 2016-02-29
Packaged: 2018-05-22 15:53:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6085776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/finalizer/pseuds/finalizer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I wouldn’t have pegged you for a rule breaker, Hux.”<br/>“This is hardly the worst breach of code I’ve partaken in.”</p><p>Or, five things Ren did not know about Hux, and one Hux didn't know about him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a perfect design

/ i /

To begin with, there was the odd surprise of waking up in Hux’s bed. Not an extraordinary feat, come to think of it, but strange enough following weeks of Ren’s silent redressing and leaving to his own quarters, Hux watching in his fucked out state from amidst the sheets.

Hux fancied a distraction and Ren was eager to oblige, crushing the twinge of emotion every time it bubbled up inside his chest as he watched the door slide shut behind him, grinding it into the ground with his heel.

And that’s all he was — a pair of hands, a cock, teeth on skin. It was all Hux wanted and it was all Ren gave.

With that in mind, he found it disconcerting to wake up to the heat of Hux’s back pressed into his bare chest, his hand draped loosely over Hux’s hip. _Cuddling_ like children. Even stranger was the fact that Hux had allowed it to happen in the first place.

Ren wasn’t an analytical mind — rather needed to be pointed in the right direction, given even the slightest suggestion of what to do next. He could unravel his arms from around Hux, gather his clothes in the dark of the room and slip out pretending it’d never happened. He could wait for Hux to come to his senses and kick him out. He could take the dismissal in silence, or taunt Hux that he’d been the one to let this happen, drifting off as quickly as he had.

“I can hear you thinking.”

Hux’s words were muffled by the pillow his face was still pressed into. Ren stilled at the interruption; he hadn’t sensed Hux waking.

He settled for a neutral response, perhaps too teasing in hindsight. “No, you can’t.”

“Perhaps not,” Hux muttered, failing to suppress the last remnants of sleep blanketing his voice, “but I can hear the gears turning in your head. Counting every means of escape.”

“I don’t want to escape.”

Hux shifted and turned, Ren lifting his arm for long enough to allow him the movement. Hux’s hair spilled over the pillow like a ragged halo as he faced him, and Ren wondered how it would look with the sunlight catching each strand; cursing the empty, dark vacuum of space and his own sentimentality.

There was a hesitancy in Hux’s eyes that didn’t quite match the certainty of his words; as if waking up in Ren’s grasp had caught him equally off guard and he didn’t want his genuine reaction to bleed through.

Ren forced himself to relax, as though the small gesture could pass over onto Hux as well, relieving the uneasiness consuming them both. They were biting words and scratching nails, unrestrained urgency in deserted corridors, not whispered nothings in a quiet bed.

Still, Ren failed to keep the observation to himself. “Your hair looks good like this. It suits you.”

Sans the product, without the immaculate sweep brushing the strands away from his face, Hux looked younger, more human. The soft waves falling into his eyes made him more of a person, less of an authoritative concept — Ren could see why Hux never left his quarters without his disguise: hard gaze and every last button tailored to perfection. He looked almost innocent without it.

“Compliments don’t suit you,” Hux told him.

Withholding a scoff, Ren hooked his leg around Hux’s and pulled him closer, shutting down the part of his mind that warned him of the line he was crossing. He didn’t care. Hux could learn to unwind.

“You can’t say _thank you_ ,” he goaded, “like the elite member of society I thought you were?”

The ice melted and Hux’s eyes narrowed with mirth, the closest to a smirk, a _smile_ , that Ren had seen from him.

“Don’t push your luck. I can still order you out.”

“You can’t order me to do anything,” Ren retorted. “Even if you could, you wouldn’t, because you haven’t done it yet.”

Ren met the challenge in Hux’s gaze and dragged his fingertips across Hux’s hip, up towards his waist, tugged him closer and closed the gap between their bodies. His touch wasn’t gentle, _he_ wasn’t gentle, and the mere thought of how easily Hux’s skin bruised spurred him on.

“I wouldn’t have expected this of you,” he told Hux, masking a grin as he nuzzled into the skin of Hux’s neck, his sudden giddiness smothered by Hux’s gasp as his teeth broke skin. “You _like_ this. I’ll bet you were just too ashamed, before, to admit you wanted me to stay.”

Hux’s hands were in Ren’s hair, pulling. Even those small movements were precise; everything Hux did was painfully calculated. It made it all the more fun to take him apart.

“You presume too much,” Hux bit out.

Ren twisted around, straddling Hux’s hips and eliciting a groan; one hand pinning both of Hux’s wrists to the mattress above his head, the other reaching down between his legs.

“Oh, so you’re not enjoying this?” he asked, a flimsy, almost airy tone to his voice. “I would have thought you were.”

Hux grit his teeth in defiance, refusing to give Ren the satisfaction of confirming his implications.

Ren smirked to himself and ducked down to once more drag his teeth down Hux’s neck, relishing in every suffocated gasp, every twitch of Hux’s body against his own.

He had no qualms about relinquishing his grip and scurrying off the bed and out of sight, leaving Hux a writhing mess in the middle of his disheveled bed. “I can stop, if you want.”

Hux dug his nails into Ren’s hips and forced out a hiss in reply. “What the hell is it that you want, Ren?”

Hux was met with a hand spreading his legs apart, and Ren’s hot breath against his collarbone. “I just need to hear you say it.”

“Say what, exactly?”

The iron grasp on his wrists was enough to leave marks and Hux was distantly thankful for the gloves that would conceal the bruising as Ren immovably held him in place, whatever his motives.

“I need you to tell me you liked it,” Ren muttered, “waking up with me right there next to you. Not the cold sheets, not the punishing emptiness. Me. So close you could just reach out and — ” he trailed his fingertips up Hux’s thigh and wrapped them around his length with no preamble, “ —  _touch_.”

Lacking the proper response, Ren flicked his wrist in an almost experimental thrust, watching with twisted satisfaction as Hux arched off the bed, practically fucking into his palm, with a choked off, “ —  _fuck, Ren_.”

Ren loosened his grip, now feather light, and stilled his movements. He waited, and raised his eyebrows in challenge when met with Hux’s glare.

“What are the magic words?” he prompted, when Hux looked just about ready to raze the room to the ground if Ren didn’t start moving again.

Hux grit his teeth, defiant pride versus wracking need.

Ren tilted his head to the side and teasingly, almost innocently dragged one finger up the underside of Hux’s cock, coaxing the words from Hux’s parted lips.

“Fine,” Hux gasped out, resenting the effect Ren had on him with every fiber of his being, cursing the first time he’d allowed Ren to indulge his destructive fancy and pin him to the bed. “Fine, Ren, you bastard. I like it. _Get on with it_.”

 

 

/ ii /

If there’d been a knock on his door, Hux would have been genuinely surprised. Instead it slid open — the swish quiet and unnerving — seemingly of its own accord. Ren wasted no time in stepping past the threshold, entirely uninvited, nor did he pay any mind to the troops making their rounds down the hall, witnessing his childish display of impropriety.

The door closed behind him and he lingered in the doorway, clad from head to toe in black, ridiculous mask and all, silent and menacing like the stuff of children’s nightmares. Hux gave it a moment, turning back to the misconduct reports he’d been revising; he gave Ren as much time as he needed to loom over him, before losing his nerve and turning in his chair to give the man his full attention.

“Yes, Ren?” he demanded. “What is it that’s important enough for you to come barging in here without invitation like the uncivilized individual you are?”

The silence hung heavy for another few seconds. Hux was on the verge of calling in a security detail and having the unsavory intruder escorted from his quarters when Ren brought his hands up to release the locks on either side of the mask, and pulled it off.

Hux refused to wilt under Ren’s sudden, scrutinizing gaze.

Finally, after what seemed like a literal eternity, Ren spoke up.

“You wear glasses.”

It wasn’t quite a question, and it was tinged with enough disbelief for Hux to wonder whether it’d been an observation or an accusation. He subconsciously let his fingers drift up to the side of his face, as if to make sure he was indeed wearing his glasses, and Ren wasn’t just projecting. Hell knew how the Force worked.

“Brilliant observation,” Hux congratulated him, when it was plain that Ren would not speak up again unless prompted. “Anything else you need?”

Like a petulant child, Ren refused to change the topic of their apparent conversation. “You never told me.”

“You never asked,” Hux shot back, almost instinctively trying to one up Ren in whatever game he was playing at. He took a breath and collected his bearings. “It’s hardly any of your concern.”

Ren remained in the doorway, impossibly still, holding his helmet in both hands like he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it.

Hux watched him for a moment — taking in the big doe eyes, the unruly mop of dark hair, the slouch in his posture, wondering how anyone had ever taken him seriously. Then there was the jarring realization that he was being petty, and that Ren could read his mind without too much effort, and Hux spun back around to face his desk.

He pushed his glasses further up his nose, though they needed no readjusting, apparently urged on by a sudden self-consciousness as Ren kept staring.

“You look silly,” Ren concluded. He took a step over to Hux’s desk and none too gently deposited the helmet in the corner.

It took a moment for Hux to process what he’d just heard, to remember that Ren was emotionally stunted and oftentimes lacked any sort of speech filter.

“I appreciate your input. What are you doing here?”

Ren moved slowly, sluggishly, circling around Hux’s desk and perching on the edge. It was painfully apparent he’d recently completed a grueling training session — slowed movements, an almost brain-dead existence that could only be remedied by an all too lengthy sleep.

“They bring out your dark circles, you know,” Ren closed his eyes as he spoke. He paused for long enough for Hux to worry he’d fallen asleep right there on his desk, sitting up. “The glasses.”

Hux clicked his datapad off and looked up at Ren. The last thing he needed was a patronizing lecture from the resident child.

“There’s no reason for concern,” he assured Ren, bidding him to leave, to let him finish his work in peace. “You ought to get some rest.”

“You’re one to speak.”

“There’s work to be done.”

“ _There’s work to be done_ ,” Ren echoed, in an awful parody of Hux’s accent.

Hux resisted the urge to drop his head into his hands. It would have been proof of weakness, of Ren’s taunting getting under his skin. He was better than that.

“Is this necessary?”

“Come to bed with me,” Ren insisted, in a seemingly spur of the moment decision. “I’ll rest if you’ll rest.”

“Is that supposed to convince me?”

“I won’t tell any of the superior officers that you’re blind as a bat without those,” Ren teased on, motioning in the general direction of Hux’s glasses with a trembling hand, weak with exhaustion.

The only thing stopping Hux from immaturely rolling his eyes were years of training, of schooling his face into a mask that betrayed no emotion.

“They’re for reading, you child.”

Inexplicably, and despite his best intentions, he reached out and took Ren’s still outstretched hand. Hux suppressed the flutter of anxiety that came from the oddly intimate touch. “Lead the way.”

Ren appeared taken aback at how simple it’d been to bend Hux to his will. He snapped out of it quickly, and lowered himself off the desk, only slightly swaying when his feet hit the ground.

Hux paused for a second, pulling the damned glasses off his face and setting them down atop his datapad, before following Ren to the bed.

“You ought to rethink your intimidation technique,” Hux told Ren, when the latter had thrown off the outer layers of his ensemble and crawled beneath the covers. Ren’s eyes were already closed, disregarding the fact that Hux hadn’t even moved to lay beside him yet. “You hardly ever speak to anyone on board, save for the occasional threat. You’d say nothing to no one.”

Hux let himself slide under the covers, and he let himself be held, as Ren beckoned him closer with a hand on his hip.

“Still,” Ren muttered, “your vanity is endearing.”

“You’re a nuisance,” Hux retorted after a moment. The words were not meant to convince Ren, rather himself, when the drowsiness was beginning to set in, and it was far more comforting than Hux cared to admit, with Ren’s arms almost protectively wrapped around him.

 

 

/ iii /

Hux came with a low groan as Ren’s fingers none too gently tangled in his sweat slicked hair, collapsing forward, burying his face in the crook of Ren’s neck.

He lay still, breathing erratic; the silence comfortable between them. Words weren’t their forte, never had been. A beat passed and he propped himself up with an elbow on either side of Ren’s head and looked down at him almost curiously, wondering if for once the man had anything to say, other than Hux’s name whimpered over and over as he spilled inside him.

Ren said nothing — eyes half shut, long eyelashes fluttering almost tiredly. His chest rose and fell heavily; fingers still wrapped around Hux’s length between them, his other hand on Hux’s hip from when he’d braced his collapse.

Stillness, silence: routine.

Hux climbed off Ren’s hips and rolled over on his side beside him. He threw an arm over his eyes to silence the immediately nagging, unrelenting voice in the back of his mind telling him to go clean himself up, in favor of relishing in the increasingly rare moments of tranquility his position of command allowed.

Ren made no outward move to get up, either, though his carelessness was hardly a surprise.

Hux lifted his arm for a split second to sneak a glance at Ren, who was staring straight up at the ceiling, seemingly still struggling to regain his breath. His hair, strewn haphazardly across the pillow, nearly merged entirely with the dark of the room.

The sheets were tousled between the two of them, tangled in Ren’s legs and Hux made a weak attempt at pulling at least a fragment of the covers towards himself, to shield from the bone-deep chill permanently permeating the halls of the ship. Disregarding the mess, making a mental note to have his sheets cleaned the next morning, Hux pulled the covers over his torso, if only to retain body heat; modesty be damned.

Moments later, with Ren still too far gone to make small talk, thank the heavens, Hux gave into his basest instincts and hauled himself onto his side, reaching over to rummage through the drawer of his bedside table.

By the time he’d turned back around, pushed himself up into a relatively upright position against the headboard, Ren was on his side, propped up on one arm, watching him closely.

“How unlikely,” he mused, thinking out loud.

Hux feigned ignorance, cigarette hanging from his lips as he struggled to ignite his lighter. “Hm?”

Ren said nothing for a moment, watching with fascinated interest as Hux lit the end of the cigarette and took a long drag. He didn’t ask if Ren minded; it was his room after all and Ren was welcome to leave any time he wished.

“All prim and proper,” Ren spoke up, tone verging on sing-song, and Hux failed to resist looking up at the ceiling in exasperation to wonder where he’d gone wrong: inviting Ren into his ass, into his _life_. “The picture perfect general of the First Order, sneaking off for a smoke behind closed doors. I wouldn’t have pegged you for a rule breaker, Hux.”

Hux was a second away from blowing a puff of smoke into Ren’s face, if only to wipe off his stupid grin, when he blessedly remembered he was an adult who could control his irrational urges. That made one of them.

“This is hardly the worst breach of code I’ve partaken in,” he said instead, instinctive banter.

Ren grunted and dropped down onto his back, one arm looped behind his head. “If you’re referring to fraternization, it doesn’t quite count with me not officially enlisted in the Order.”

Hux considered if merely one smoke was sufficient with Ren in such proximity. “It counts well enough.”

“I’ve never smelled it on you,” Ren went on, seemingly fascinated by the whole concept, a side of Hux he hadn’t yet seen. It was almost laughable, that he thought he knew everything.

“If you could, so could any other officer,” Hux countered, then tauntingly added, “How _improper_ that would be.”

Undeterred, Ren kept pushing. “I still think I would have known.”

“You’re inattentive, lover.”

Hux’s words came out with a certain finality, and a hush came over Ren as he mutely accepted defeat.

Hux elaborated. “You’re so dead set on whatever it is you spend your time doing, I daresay you’d even fail to notice — say, if I had a pet running around.”

There was a huff of a laugh from Ren.

Hux drew in a deep breath, letting the smoke swirl in his throat, his lungs, before exhaling. “Besides. You didn’t know because I didn’t want you to. Not particularly. It’s not as though we tell each other our darkest, deepest secrets.”

There was a knowing lilt to his voice and Ren felt apprehensive for the shortest of moments. It was a needless worry. Hux’s knowledge of him was limited.

He masked his flicker of doubt with humor, however clumsy. “Now, that’s not exactly the basis of a budding relationship.” He paused, regretting the words the second they left his lips. “Or whatever the hell this is.”

Hux seemed to remain impassive, unmoved by the admission. Or perhaps his mask was serving its purpose — same as the physical one Ren wore to hide his expressive reactions.

It was inaudible, when Hux finally echoed Ren’s words back to him.

“Or whatever the hell this is.”

 

 

/ iv /

The first time Ren had asked Hux to spar with him, Hux had been a hair away from laughing in his face. He’d been neck deep in progress reports from the construction of the Starkiller, going on three hours of sleep a night at most, increasingly often skipping rest altogether. It was a tiresome process, but progress demanded sacrifice.

He’d agreed, for whatever reason. Perhaps as a method of stress relief — hitting something always seemed to help, especially if it was Ren. Or perhaps simply to tire himself out, to shut down his overworked mind and get the night of sleep he so deserved.

Practically asleep on his feet, he’d followed Ren into one of the training rooms. It was empty, of course, Ren had always valued his privacy.

It’d taken less than a minute for him to take a hit to the head and black out.

The next time Ren offered, however, Hux had agreed again; insisting that this time they do it the proper way —

The proper way was stripped down to training attire, alone in the facility, Hux well rested and fully conscious, for a change.

Ren was flat on his back, panting up at Hux as he stood over him triumphantly. Ren had brute strength on his side, the advantage of constant practice, though that didn’t prevent Hux from being quick enough to knock his feet out from under him — for the third time that day.

“I’m impressed,” Ren muttered, dropping his head back onto the mat. “Who knew you could hold your own — especially after last time.”

“Please, I was dead on my feet.”

Hux extended a hand, offering Ren a lift back to his feet. It wasn’t the smartest move, strategically, with every possibility of Ren using his courtesy against him and striking the moment he was back upright.

With a grunt, Ren took the hand and stood. “Still. I’m amazed the wind doesn’t just knock you over every time you leave the base. You’re practically weightless.”

Hux knew it was deliberate taunting, provocation, but he swung at Ren anyway. Ren intercepted his fist and twisted it behind Hux’s back, pulling him flush against his own chest.

“And you say I’m the one with the short temper,” he whispered against Hux’s neck, tightening his grip on Hux’s wrist as he struggled to get free.

There was a moment of stillness, as Hux rendered himself entirely motionless, before he jabbed his free elbow into Ren’s gut and tore away from his grasp.

“Here’s the difference between us, Ren,” he explained, taking a few steps back and facing his opponent. “You take your frustrations out at the most inopportune of times, on my men, on my equipment, on anything and everything that gets in your way. Whereas I miraculously manage to refrain from punching you unless we’re in a controlled environment. Such as now.”

“Where’s the fun in that?”

Silence settled over, punctuated by heavy breathing. They’d been at it for hours. Hux absentmindedly wondered if he was needed elsewhere.

“If you were, someone would have called for you,” Ren assured him.

Hux snapped back to attention. “Don’t do that.”

With a defensive shrug, Ren said, “I can’t. It’s so quiet and you’re thinking so loud. You’re so distracted. Here — ”

He took a step closer and Hux immediately tensed, prepared to intercept whatever blow Ren directed at him. There were no limits to Ren’s deceitfulness: Hux knew his soft tone was little more than a precursor of a crafty attack.

Instead, Ren set his hands on either side of Hux’s hips, adjusting them ever so slightly.

“You’re too tense,” he told Hux. “You have to let go.”

Hux hesitated, briefly unsure of what to do with his hands, then settled them on Ren’s biceps for lack of better placement. Shameless self-indulgence: if Ren insisted on stepping close enough, Hux would take due advantage.

“You go ahead and fight like a berserker,” Hux said. “I’ll keep my head on straight. Think before I make a foolish move.”

Ren’s fingers brushed the skin beneath the hem of Hux’s shirt and Hux barely repressed a shiver. There was something oddly intimate about the touch, not a trace of ulterior motive. Hux wasn’t sure how that made him feel; he was hardly sure of anything when Ren was concerned.

“I’m not telling you not to think,” Ren was saying, “just to think a little less. Open your mind to everything that surrounds you. Stop caging yourself in your consciousness.”

Hux scoffed. “And next you’re going to be teaching me to float objects around the room, yes?”

Ren bristled at the jab. He dug his fingers into Hux’s waist and forcefully dragged him closer. Hux didn’t fight against Ren’s grip; his hands were bound to leave bruises either way.

“You’re making fun of what you don’t understand.”

“And I don’t need you to help me understand it,” Hux countered. “I highly doubt I’ll be going up against many of your sort in my life. I’m just fine with what I’ve got.”

“But you could be more. You’re better than I thought. I didn’t realize you could fight like that.”

Flattery would get him nowhere.

“Yes, because I was appointed general for my good looks, clearly.”

Ren ducked his head lower, breaching the barriers of Hux’s personal space. “Why won’t you just let me teach you?”

Steadfast, Hux met his gaze. “I have other responsibilities. Quite a lot, actually, if you’ll believe. Most far more important than exchanging blows with you for hours a day.”

He bit his lip and watched in satisfaction as Ren’s eyes trailed down to his mouth, wholly distracted.

Hux wasted no time in snapping his hands down to grab Ren’s wrists and wrench them off his waist; then delivered a swift, unanticipated kick to Ren’s gut, sending him sprawling across the mat.

Climbing over Ren, straddling his hips and pinning his arms above his head, Hux leaned in close — a mirror image of Ren’s previous attempt at intimidating him.

“Besides. I don’t need your help.”

 

 

/ v /

“I’ve always found it odd that you chose this specific location for the base,” Ren mused aloud.

They were staring at the wide expanse of snow and forest, extending for miles upon miles in every direction — a scouting mission, to oversee the construction of the weapon from a physical point of view. Spreadsheets and reports weren’t everything, and Hux had insisted to personally vet the terrain, make sure the works were proceeding according to plan.

Ren, however, had tagged along to be a bother.

“I didn’t choose it,” Hux argued. “Many planets were under observation, this one in particular made the cut. The specifications were agreeable, the location advantageous. I simply approved the decision.”

Ren stayed silent, and Hux could already sense whatever immature comment was bound to come spewing past his lips.

As suspected, it wasn’t a minute later that Ren spoke up, tone humored. “Aren’t you going to ask me why?”

“Why what?”

“Why I find it odd — that you approved of this slab of ice.”

Hux couldn’t care less; indulged Ren anyway. “Entertain me.”

Ren turned to face him, long hair whipping across his smirk as the wind mercilessly howled on.

“You detest the cold,” he said. “Even now you’re shivering and want nothing more than to go back inside. And no,” he added, as Hux shot him a glare, “I didn’t get that from your mind. I can see your nose turning red. Your hands are stuffed in your pockets. Do you want to borrow my cloak?”

Hux turned a blind eye to the obvious mockery and kept walking. It was dire that the weapon not be visible from the outer atmosphere, shielded from prying eyes until the time came to reveal its true power. Hux had to see for himself — verify the competence of those constructing the future of the Order.

He barely took ten steps forward before Ren grabbed the back of his coat and swerved them both behind the nearest tree. Hux’s back hit the bark as Ren held him in place.

“Ren, what the hell — ”

Ren’s gloved hand clamped over his mouth before he could get another word out, and Hux barely resisted the instinct to knee Ren in the groin. It was the urgency in his eyes that did it.

“There’s someone out there,” Ren muttered. “Not one of ours.”

It was almost charming, the way Ren said _ours_ , despite his constant insistence that he was not and never would be part of the hierarchy. Hux dismissed the thought before Ren could intercept it.

He forced Ren’s hand away from his mouth and looked over his shoulder. There was, in fact, a lone figure treading through the otherwise desolate snow, heading in their general direction — the direction of the base headquarters.

“How do you know they’re hostile?”

It was to be expected, Ren’s raised eyebrow. _Don’t doubt me_ , it said.

“I’ll be right back.”

Hux barely had the time to reach out and wrap his fingers in the back of Ren’s cowl to pull him back. “What exactly do you plan to do?”

“My job, _General_ , is to protect the Order,” Ren explains, pronouncing Hux’s rank as if it were derogatory. “Let me go.”

Hux didn’t release him. “I take it you’re going to go down there and slice them clean in half with that monstrosity of yours,” he said, nodding his head down to motion at Ren’s lightsaber. “Say they’re not alone, that there’s more. You want to attract that much attention?”

Ren stopped attempting to fight free of Hux’s grip, instead whirled around to stare him down. “I suppose you have a better idea?”

Hux met his cold glare, undeterred. “You don’t know who it is, nor do you know who sent them. _If_ someone sent them. Could be a poor soul who’d crash landed on the nearest surface for lack of a better choice. Do you really want to go down there and look them in the eye, slaughter them like a rampant animal?”

The figure was near enough for Ren to make out a blaster dangling from their side. Resistance or not, it was not a good sign.

“So you’re going to let some armed vagabond wander around your base,” Ren spat, “just like that.”

All traces of humor vanished from Hux’s face at Ren’s assumption. He unhanded Ren, and reached beneath his coat to unholster his weapon. Pushing himself up off the tree, he turned, flicked the safety off and fired without hesitation. The figure collapsed onto the snow.

“No,” Hux clarified, replacing the blaster. “I’m simply not going to make a scene of getting rid of them.”

Ren was staring between the fallen intruder and Hux’s icy glare. It was all rather serious and that made him want to burst out laughing.

“I didn’t think you’d get your hands dirty so eagerly,” he told Hux. “Thought you were above that.”

“Ren, can you shut up, so we can get on with the excursion?”

Hux found himself being pinned back against the tree, Ren’s fingers curled around his arms hard enough to bruise.

“You — execute someone at point blank and expect me to ignore that?” Ren inquired, face inches away from Hux’s. “And here I was thinking you were just a paper pusher shouting orders; but now I find out you’re not too bad of a shot, either.”

Hux wasn’t quite sure why his next response came out as defensive as it did; especially with Ren’s words sounding like an offhanded compliment. He didn’t particularly feel the need to prove himself to Ren, to justify his abilities —

He shut down his mind, Ren was looking at him closely enough for Hux to suspect him of frolicking around in his thoughts.

“I completed the Aca — ”

“The Academy, yes,” Ren interrupted. “But it takes something else entirely to pull the trigger, now, doesn’t it?”

Ignoring the snow and sleet whipping against his skin, Hux focused on Ren’s face. Intense, calculating, pupils blown.

“Do you have a hard on right now?” he asked. Ren’s tension was nearly palpable in the air — it was an easy conclusion.

Ren tried and failed to school his expression into one more neutral. He pursed his lips and gave his act away. “What would it say about me if I did?”

At some point, Ren had released Hux’s arms, letting him raise them to balance against his chest instead; the sole point of warm contact in the frozen wasteland.

“I’d say you’re insane,” Hux muttered, glancing up at Ren, reigning him in, coaxing him closer.

Ren found the time to murmur a choked off, “What else is new?” before their lips met. He braced his hands on the tree, on either side of Hux’s head, as Hux wrapped his fingers in the front of Ren’s cloak to tug him closer.

Ren huffed into the kiss and slowly pulled away — begrudgingly so, but a price had to be paid for his need to tease Hux. “All this time I’d have thought you hated me.”

“I do,” Hux insisted. Quickly, before he let himself deny it.

He lifted his hands up and tangled them in Ren’s hair to drag him down once more. He kissed him and failed to suppress a gasp as Ren pressed up against him, as he took Hux’s bottom lip between his teeth and nearly bit clean through it.

It was warm, it was _scalding_ , so unlike the blizzard that raged around them — it was almost a shame to acquiesce to mortality and break apart for air.

Ren leaned his forehead against Hux’s. “Admit it, you like me.”

Hux struggled to find a suitable reply. He didn’t hate Ren; he wanted to, but he didn’t.

“I hate you,” he said anyway.

 

 

/ + vi /

The weapon had been cleared for use: all systems online and operational, every last maintenance sweep reported back flawless. It was almost reason enough for celebration. Almost — Hux didn’t _celebrate_. Not in the traditional sense.

A bottle of top shelf liquor, passed between him and Ren, who by all means didn’t regularly behave as one old enough to be drinking it, was the peak of Hux’s plans for the evening. He wasn’t one to throw parties, per se.

By the time it was half empty, Hux was certain he’d been the one to drink the majority. Either Ren was a lightweight and attempting to hide it, or Hux was far worse at cutting back than he thought himself to be.

They were seated on the floor, facing a wall-wide transparasteel viewport. It was unusually serene: him and Ren alone in the same room, within touching proximity of one another, and not a single insult had been hurled in the hours they’d shared. It was the calm before a storm, no doubt.

They’d talked, initially, about the specifics of the base, of the Supreme Leader’s plans for the Order’s next moves. It was essentially meaningless chatter, something neither of them was particularly skilled at; especially in regards to each other. They much preferred to spend their joint time in comfortable silence.

Of course Ren, the blasted bastard, had to ruin it all.

“You don’t get along with your father,” he said suddenly. It was more of an observation than an actual question, and Hux couldn’t stop himself from whipping his head around to face Ren.

“Where did you get that idea?” he demanded.

Ren wilted slightly under Hux’s glare. He’d breached a sensitive topic, no doubt, and Hux knew full well how to intimidate, even without his oversized coat to physically make him appear bigger.

“Your first name,” Ren clarified, uncharacteristically tentative. “You refuse to use it.”

Hux set his jaw. “I don't quite see how that ties to my father.”

Raising the bottle to his lips to buy himself time, Ren turned to fully face Hux. He didn’t answer the question; kept pushing, instead. “You never refer to yourself by your name. He chose it. You don’t like it. Or what it’s associated with.”

“No one refers to themselves in the third person, Ren.”

Ren looked away. “In your mind, I mean.”

Of course. “Oh, so you’re spending time in my head now. Fucking charming. A new low, even for you.”

Hux snatched the bottle from Ren, who relinquished his grip without hesitation. Let Hux have his drink, let him forget the topic at hand.

“I don’t,” Ren started. “ — I don’t actively spy on your thoughts. It’s just — they’re too loud sometimes, not to hear.”

Hux said nothing in response. He didn’t trust himself to scold Ren in his borderline drunk state without letting anything too personal slip past his lowered guard. Besides, if Ren wanted to pry, he might as well have scoured Hux’s mind for the information — it was not as if he held any reservations about doing so before.

He drank in silence and Ren watched as he gradually drained the bottle. So much for revelry, it seemed: Ren had successfully turned Hux’s celebratory drink into self-pitying wallowing.

Fuck it, he was drunk.

“No, you’re right,” Hux muttered eventually, setting the bottle down between them. He rationalized he’d be unable to tame his inevitable hangover before work the next morning if he took another sip. “We weren’t exactly close.”

Ren’s fingers were wrapped loosely around the neck of the bottle. He didn’t seem too eager to pick it up, rather bent on listening to what Hux apparently had to say.

“I’ll save you the sob story, it’s far too maudlin for tonight.”

“You don’t have to say anything,” Ren quickly assured him. Hux thought he picked up a bitter undertone to Ren’s voice, as if the paternal topic was personal for him as well, though he chalked that up to the alcohol obstructing his sanity.

“I don’t think — ” Hux started anyway, swallowing a bitter laugh. The words spilled past his lips before his brain could interfere. “ — He never thought I was good enough, no matter how hard I pushed myself. Hell knows he’d probably find some trace of incompetence in what I do now. If he were still around, that is.”

The look Ren gave him was blatantly concerned.

“I didn’t kill him,” Hux snapped.

“I never said you did.”

“It looks like you’re thinking it,” Hux explained. “Like you’re just — sitting there, judging me. It’s really disconcerting, that you’re the one looking down on me now.”

Ren wasn’t too sure how to work his way around a drunk General Hux, words slurring together, barely holding himself upright.

There was no need to be gentle. Hux could handle the brutal truth, so Ren teased as he always would, “You don't seem the type to conceal such insecurities beneath that impassiveness.”

Hux snorted. “And I wouldn’t have expected that scary mask of yours to be hiding a bickering five year old. Surprises, surprises.”

He reached for the bottle but Ren snatched it away, his reflexes undeniably faster in comparison to Hux’s in his hazy state.

The silence stretched on for a moment before Hux spoke up. “I don’t know yours.”

Ren visibly stilled, knowing full well what Hux was referring to, and wishing he didn’t. Wishing for Hux to get his act together and black out already, if only to avoid answering.

“What?” he offered, tone as confused as he could manage.

Hux waved his hand incomprehensibly, struggling with words. “Your name. You know mine. I don’t know yours. Your real name,” he clarified.

“You don’t need to,” Ren almost snapped. Almost — Hux was drunk and didn’t deserve to be barked at. He probably wouldn’t remember any of it tomorrow.

“That doesn’t seem fair. I told you mine.”

Ren tilted his head and managed a laugh. “No, I found it out myself. You never actually told me.”

“Armitage,” Hux said. Quickly, as if to get it over with as fast as possible. “There. Secret’s officially out.”

He stared at Ren expectantly, almost swaying in place as he awaited a reply. Ren wondered if maybe, just maybe, the universe would help him out just this once and render Hux unconscious before he was obliged to answer.

Regardless, it didn’t seem fair. Hux had been honest. Egged on by too much whiskey, but honest nonetheless.

“Ben,” he murmured finally.

Hux huffed and let his eyes flutter shut.

“Ben,” he echoed. “That’s silly.”

Ren watched closely, as Hux’s breathing shallowed and he drooped forward. It’d have been funny to watch him fall face first onto the ground, wake up the next morning hungover and bruised. Despite his best intentions, Ren braced his descent, letting Hux lean against his shoulder.

Hux’s whisper was barely audible before he drifted off. “Kylo suits you much better.”

**Author's Note:**

> hux is the little spoon pass it on


End file.
